Student artwork stolen

A Public Safety report filed Tuesday reported four student paintings and drawings stolen sometime in the past week from the Lewis Center for the Arts at 185 Nassau St.

In addition, five student paintings and drawings were stolen from the building between Feb. 1 and March 26, according to the report. One student-produced sculpture was also vandalized during this time period. Some of the stolen artwork was part of students’ senior theses and junior independent work.

It is not yet known who stole the paintings, how many people were involved in the thefts, and whether the thefts and vandalism are related, Deputy Director for Public Safety Charles Davall said.

Visual arts lecturer Julia Jacquette said that it seems likely that the thefts and the vandalism are related, since they occurred around the same time.

“For me personally, it’s the process that counts more and ... that it’s in my head, so I’m not devastated that [my] painting is gone,” Waqas Jawaid ’10 said. He added, however, that “this is something that should not happen.” Jawaid is also a former cartoonist for The Daily Princetonian.

“[I’m in an] intro painting class, so we’re just starting now and our first paintings are obviously very important to us,” said Bilhuda Rasheed ’10, who lost a painting. “Nothing is like a painting that you have spent hours and hours and hours on. It signifies a step in your artistic process.”

“Whomever took the artwork had an uncanny ability to choose artwork that the artist had put an enormous amount of time and concentration into,” Jacquette added.

Jacquette, however, does not believe that there should be more security measures in the building. “185 Nassau Street is actually the most secure art building I have ever taught in,” she said. Both Jawaid and Rasheed agreed that not many more structural changes could be made to make the building more secure.

Nonetheless, Jacquette noted that Princeton is an “open campus” and rooms are not always locked, perhaps facilitating theft. “Whomever took this work seems to know the ins and outs of 185 Nassau,” she explained, noting that “they even took work from a restricted area where one needs to know a punch code to enter.”

“We can be more cautious and lock the doors behind us,” Rasheed said. “We should make people realize how important [our artwork] is to us. That’s probably the best way to prevent [future theft].”

“Everybody should know what happened so they can be more alert,” Jawaid said.

Students will not be penalized for having their artwork taken and will get credit for their work, Jacquette said.

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Rasheed, however, is still worried about the impact of the theft on her Princeton education. “I’m thinking of applying for a visual [arts] certificate,” Rasheed said, explaining that losing her painting was a real setback to creating the portfolio that is required to apply.

“We think that having the students exhibit their work is a very interesting and informative part of the art-making process,” Jacquette said. Though all the stolen artwork was taken from studios and not exhibitions, she worries that the thefts may deter students from exhibiting their work in the future.

“Our number one concern is that the artworks are returned to the student artists. No questions asked,” Jacquette said.

The other students who lost artwork are Dinah Chen ’11, Alex Godfrey ’10, Cindy Michalak ’09, Sara Prescott ’08 and Jessie Thompson ’08. The sculpture that was vandalized was created by Jon Huddleson ’08.